Coward
by DobbyRocksSocks
Summary: It was just one night, but it changed everything. Warnings inside.


**Disclaimer - I own nothing you recognise. **

**Challenges listed at the bottom. **

**Word Count **\- 741

**Pairing **\- RegulusRabastan

_Warnings for mentions of sex and character death. _

* * *

**Coward **

* * *

"Regulus? What are you doing hiding back here?"

Regulus blinked, looking up at the man he knew only as his cousin's new husband's brother. "You know my name?"

"Uh. Sure. Why wouldn't I?"

Regulus shrugged awkwardly. He probably shouldn't have asked that, but he was tired and he wanted nothing more than to go home to his bed. Unfortunately, his mother was having a grand old time, so it was unlikely he'd be permitted to leave anytime soon.

"Sorry. I, uh. I'm tired."

"Aren't we all? I'm Rabastan, in case you didn't catch it earlier during the introductions."

Regulus swallowed hard and nodded. "Okay."

Rabastan chuckled. "You're precious. I think I'll keep you."

…

"I hear Amycus has taken an interest in you," Rabastan murmured, raising his eyebrow as he took a sip from his goblet of wine.

"My dog speaks more eloquently," Regulus retorted, rolling his eyes. "I swear, someone needs to introduce the man to a _bath." _

Rabastan snorted. "You don't have a dog."

The arch of Regulus' eyebrow spoke all by itself.

"How do you feel?" Rabastan asked, nodding to Regulus' left arm. "Does it still hurt?"

Regulus wanted to admit that it still felt like there were a million billywigs stinging his skin, but he merely shook his head. "It's fine."

The look on Rabastan's face told Regulus that he knew exactly how he felt.

"Here," Rabastan offered up his goblet. "Try some of this. It may numb it a little for you."

…

Hands touched him everywhere, making him dizzy. How was Rabastan everywhere when he was just one man? How was he making Regulus feel so good in so many places when he only had two hands.

It felt like Regulus was being initiated into some super secret club, one that offered amazing pleasure from fingertips, from lips, from tongues.

For someone that could offer such destruction—Regulus knew what Rabastan could do, he'd seen it first hand—it was amazing the pleasure those same hands could offer.

Long past words, Regulus moaned helplessly as Rabastan took him apart piece by piece and rebuilt him into something _better. _

…

"It was a mistake. It can't happen again."

…

Strange, being at the meetings without Rabastan smirking at him across the room. Now the man ignored him entirely. He didn't stop to speak with Regulus afterwards or before, didn't pull him off to a dark corner for a repeat of their one night together, didn't offer up his latest radical idea for Regulus to scorn and laugh.

Regulus hated it.

He cornered Rabastan once, hoping to talk some sense into the man, but it was to no avail. Regulus couldn't help but regret that night now. It had been the most pleasurable night he'd ever had, but it had taken away the most important man in his life.

There was no pleasure in that.

…

"Regulus… I'm sorry."

Regulus rolled his eyes and turned away. He had no wish to rehash it now, now that he'd locked away the knowledge of how Rabastan looked lost to pleasure, how he'd felt against Regulus, the way he sounded when he was on the edge of oblivion.

"You can't stay mad forever," Rabastan cajoled.

Regulus shook his head. "I'm not mad. I just don't care anymore."

"I never meant to hurt you!"

"I was just another notch on your bedpost," Regulus replied flatly. "But it wasn't that that hurt me. It was the way you erased yourself from my life, like I meant absolutely nothing to you. But like I said, I no longer care. You can continue about your life without guilt, Rabastan."

Rabastan opened his mouth a few times as though he was about to say something, but then he shook his head and walked away, his shoulders tensed and his head down.

…

"I ignored you because I was scared. I ignored you because it was easier than admitting that I loved you. I ignored you because I wanted to save myself the pain of you rejecting me. I was a coward and I fucked up."

The words were spoken to the dark wood door of Regulus' room, but there was no answer. Rabastan sighed and let his head fall against the door, a single tear slipping down his face.

"I'm sorry, Regulus."

…

_It was three days later that he heard the soul destroying news that Regulus Black was missing; considered dead, a traitor to the cause. _

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**Written for: **

Disney - D4. "You know my name?" / "Uh. Sure. Why wouldn't I?"

Trope of the Month - 8. Destructive

Space - 10 Secret

Showtime - 19. Regret

Amber's Attic - 6. "My dog speaks more eloquently."

Scamander's Case - 13. Soul

Film Festival - 11. Radical

Funfair - North - How Many Objects? Jar Of Beads - "I was just another notch on your bedpost."

Funfair - East - Wedding Chapel - RabastanRegulus

Funfair - South - Lazy River - "It was a mistake."

365\. 141. Knowledge

1000 - 274. "You can't stay mad forever."

Scavenger Hunt - 58. A Pairing with less than 100 fics.


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